Monday, September 19, 2011

Book Review: The Hypnotist by Lars Kepler

Summary from GoodReads: Prepare for The Hypnotist to cast its spell In
the frigid clime of Tumba, Sweden, a gruesome triple homicide attracts
the interest of Detective Inspector Joona Linna, who demands to
investigate the murders. The killer is still at large, and there’s only
one surviving witness—the boy whose family was killed before his eyes.
Whoever committed the crimes wanted this boy to die: he’s suffered more
than one hundred knife wounds and lapsed into a state of shock.
Desperate for information, Linna sees only one option: hypnotism. He
enlists Dr. Erik Maria Bark to mesmerize the boy, hoping to discover the
killer through his eyes. It’s the sort of work that Bark has sworn he
would never do again—ethically dubious and psychically scarring. When he
breaks his promise and hypnotizes the victim, a long and terrifying
chain of events begins to unfurl. An international sensation, The Hypnotist
is set to appear in thirty-seven countries, and it has landed at the
top of bestseller lists wherever it’s been published—in France, Holland,
Germany, Spain, Italy, Denmark. Now it’s America’s turn. Combining the
addictive power of the Stieg Larsson trilogy with the storytelling drive
of The Silence of the Lambs, this adrenaline-drenched thriller is spellbinding from its very first page.

My Review: I recently started a new job that is an hour away and I was wondering what I was going to do with myself for 2 hours a day while I was driving. I decided that I was going to try audiobooks and I now don't know what I did before I started listening to audiobooks in the car. I have to say this book kept my alert on the ride to and from work. It started out fast paced and continued that way throughout the entire book. I really liked that the book was told from the perspective of several people. It also went from the present to the future to the past again in terms of the timeline. While some may find that irritating I like that the author used this as a way to keep things a surprise. While one character may be experiencing one thing another may have a completely different reaction to the same thing. For those of the feint of heart this is not the book for you. This book is quite gruesome and at times a little hard to handle. That being said, I am a bit of a weirdo and I like that kind of thing. If you like a good mystery I suggest you pick this up. Being titled the Hypnotist this book has a lot of information on hypnosis and what it kind be used for. I found the information to be really interesting. I couldn't get enough of this book and even found myself listening to it before bed. Overall I give this book 4 out of 5 stars.

1 comment:

I had high hopes for this book based on the number of good reviews. However, I found the book to be boring and poorly written. I failed to develop an attachment for any of the characters, nor did I believe the events involving the main murder suspect could have possibly happened given his physical condition. If your looking to read a good police procedural by a Swedish author, I would suggest Henning Mankell & his Kurt Wallander series. Mankell is not for everyone, but his books are far better written and more interesting than "The Hypnotist".